


Apple Of My Eye

by Gildedmuse



Series: The Grocery Store Panic Dance (A Slice Of Life Medley) [4]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Cause Aziraphale Doesn't Do Well With Attraction, Domestic Fluff, Gen, Idiots In Domestic Bliss, Light Angst, M/M, One Shot, One Sided Or Pre-Slash, Or Even Just Shopping, Or Technology After The 1900s, Originally Posted on LiveJournal, Short & Sweet, Slice of Life, You Know Crowley Still Loves His Angel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 03:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18652303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gildedmuse/pseuds/Gildedmuse
Summary: Just because they don't need to eat doesn't mean they don't so it only makes sense to do some shopping.





	Apple Of My Eye

**Author's Note:**

> [Originally posted to LJ in 2008 or so. Part of a series of domestic fluff/slice of life fics.]

 

**Apple Of My Eye**

“I’m starving.”  
  
Angels, Aziraphale reminded himself for the fourty second time in the last hour,don’t glare. It  _simply_  isn’t done. The whole big show of annoyance was, after all, far below etheral beings, blessed as they were with empathy, kindness, and an infinite amount of patience (he really should check to see precisely how infinity that was). Regardless, the facts were that he was an angel and angels did not  _glare_.

Aziraphale’s eye twitched. His fingers fluttered nervously through the air trying not to keep them from.... Well to be honest he wasn't completely sure, buy he had this sinking feeling it might have been something less than unangelic.

“You’re not going to starve,” he said in a what he hoped was a gentle, calming voice. The sort of voice a mother uses on a child to get them into bed right before she breaks down and locks herself in the kitchen with a bottle of whine. Not that any mothers would do such a thing, he believes he may have pictured up the idea from some misdelivered strangely, well, detailed novels or perhaps  he'd seen it on Crowley's picture box and alright some of those poor woman through the 1800 and 1900 hundreds. Best not to dwell.

Though dwelling might be less....  _Vexing_  than this. (Vexing seemed appropriate and allowable given  his company). "You are a demon," Aziraphale clipped in a practiced tone. One met to remind both of them of their loyalties. It had the unfortunate habit if coming off less as a condemnation and more a consternation.

"Oh come off it Angel," Crowley did that sneer Aziraphale knew was just him pouting more and graciously ignore the tone. "You once almost lost your head for crepes and your telling me you're suddenly not interested in going out?"

Aziraphale tried very hard to cover a wince. Home Office was still suspicious, unsure what he was and constantly sending memos for the smallest slights. They may have been a bunch of, well, wrong headed bullies but God's plan was still....

Aziraphale was not sure he could explain to Crowley. Not after everything. Not after Their Side.

 He did  WANT to be good.  Even if he wanted to glare and worry and.. well he was an Angel, so he supposed what he wanted was goodness and peace and the occasional sushi and a good book. The other things had to be his  _influence_.

You know very well our kind can’t starve.” Aziraphale's new tactic involved trying to too busy  it was very difficult when he didn't honestly have much to be busy about. Besides, Crowley had this rather unsettling way if being distracting. 

Which, if Aziraphale were honest (which of course he was! Usually...) That was what this was really about. 

Unfortunately or perhaps fortunately considering the mess he was making of it, Crowley didn't even notice Aziraphale's attempts to appear occupied. The demon was far too  busy himself, though mostly pouting, the occasion moans, and of course his hands wrapped around him stomach to muffle what he swore "on my own... Well on SOMEONE'S grave" were loud growls of hunger pains.

Aziraphale suspected it was more likely the old wooden chair groaning, as Crowley insists on using only the back legs to balance on.

“Just because it won’t kill me doesn’t mean I can’t starve,” Crowley sighed, clearly annoyed with the angel. Aziraphale failed to see the logic in this. He failed to see the logic in a lot of things Crowley does, like the way he carried around a phone with no attachment to a wall. Admittedly, he had never been the most "edge of cutting" when it came now to modern technical electronics, but he was rather sure a phone required wires to work.

Still, this was one battle where the forces if good shall prevail and he would not allow Crowley to confuse him into.... Well whatever the demon's will plan was.

“Then make a cup of tea,” Aziraphale suggested still putting around with determination though not actually any idea what he was to be doing. “I have plenty of tea in there.”  
  
Crowley didnt stop pouting which was not distracting in the least. “I don’t want tea,” He groaned. “I want food.”  
  
“Then go out and get some.”

It had to be said Aziraphale was particularly fond of this suggestion as it involved Crowley leaving him alone for at least half an hour. Aziraphale would consider that in itself some sort of heavenly miracle.

Of course that only brought the guilt.

It was hardly Crowley’s fault he was here, after all. Crowley had made that point abundantly clear; first when he'd shown up at the bookshop almost a fortnight past with suitcase in hand and subsequently about more seven times through the days. 

Apparently Crowley’s superiors were not requite finished with him and he reaaoned the safest place to stay low would be with the angel.

After all, who would expect a demon to hide out with an angel? So it couldn’t have been Crowley’s fault, since staying with Aziraphale  _was_  the only real solution.  
  
Although... Now that Aziraphale thought about it none of that makes sense. Yet, it had seemed so logical at the time. How was Aziraphale to know that hiding out in his shop would involve being with Crowley for days on end while the demon complained about everything from what the lightening did to his complexion to the smell of old books, to the strange customers to dust clinging to his clothes. 

Though perhaps Aziraphale didn't mind do much him scaring away the costumers before they could actually buy anything.

For a moment Aziraphale was lost in thoughts and, well, books and since his companion hadn't voiced any dismissal, Aziraphale even started to believe Crowley has taken his suggestion to he-

"Oh, Dear!"  He had not been expsting the rather taller demon to be so close, his arm resting in the bookshelf right behind Aziraphale.

It was... Distracting  as only Crowley could be.

"Know what we should do?" Setimed it is easy to forget that Crowley was, at heart, a tempter OF MAN. But that meant occasionally being a bit more... Well, frightening than Aziraphale knows his friend actually was. "We should go shopping."

Aziraphale raised an eyebrow. It has not been what he'd been expecting“. He was rather sure he didn't have the faintest clue what he'd been waiting for anyway. This seemed much safer.

But also, particularly for the demon, stranger.

“Shopping,” Crowley repeated, enonciating so slowly Aziraphale couldn't help rolling his eyes which seems allowable. “For food. It’s not like you have any here.” Crowley motioned to the empty cupboards. Or where they would perhaps have been behind the books and papers.  
  
Aziraphale was beginning to get the feeling that this had less to do with Crowley’s stomach and more to do with him being cooped up in a bookstore for days and still being too nervous to venture out alone.

He should had told him that if he were so desperate to shop he could go do so himself. All the better if his superiors found him. After all, Aziraphale might have been an angel but he certainly wasn’t expected to keep demons safe. Crowley wasn't the only one in trouble with home office.

Aziraphale sighed and gently laid down the book he'd been pretending to stack. He messaged his temple gently. This helps to restrain any sort of glare that might slip past his resistances. "My dear, can we at least make this fast."

Crowley was out of his chair so fast that Aziraphale knew there must have been some sort of magic involved.

“Excellent,” he said, sliding on his sunglasses. Aziraphale occasionally worried about his friend’s obsession with sunglasses, but then he was sure Crowley often thought the same of him and books. And tea. And oh probably lots of things now that he was thinking of it.  “It’s just down the street, right? We’ll just stop in to pick up a few things here and there. You know… To tie me over until this all settles down.”  
  
Aziraphale had just enough time to slip on his coat before Crowley was pulling him out the door. This earned them a few strange looks though not nearly as many as when Crowley uses Aziraphale as a sort of shield the entire way down to the groceries.

“Are you sure you aren’t just drawing more attention to yourself, my dear?” Aziraphale asked as patiently whenas one could at this point. Crowley didn't answer, instead taking a runninb dive for the shop door.

All  Aziraphale can do is offer an apologetic smile to the woman standing shocked at the door.  She's clutching her purse to her chest as she hurries off. 

Apparently she hadn't needed anything at the store after all.

“She seemed nice,” Aziraphale commented before screaming. It’s not so much a scream as a high-pitched squeal that gained the attention of every shoppers that had not already  been staring.  
  
Crowley had grabbed hold to Aziraphale’s shoulders, shielded behind the now frazzled (yet still attempting to give everyone a calming, nothing to see here smile - it was seemingly having the opposite effect) angel.

“You see any demon looking blokes?” Crowley hissed in his ear which Aziraphale found unnecessarily distracting all things considered.

“What exactly should I be looking for?” Aziraphale was not snarky. He was, perhaps, tetchy. 

Honestly, his demon reference was not very large and most of them had been in their rather more hellish state. Oh well plus Crowley he supposed but that hardly counts now does it. “No one else is wearing sunglasses inside, if that’s what you’re asking.”

"Swarms of flies? Head frogs? Eyes of eternal hellfire?"

"My dear boy!"

Crowley let go of Aziraphale's shoulder, stepping out like he hadn't been cowarding only seconds ago. He brushes off his suit and said, “Good enough.”  
  
Aziraphale grabbed a basket and asked, desperate for people to stop with all the staring, “What exactly are we looking for?”  
  
Crowley strolled down isles without sparing a glance at what they contained. “Just grab something,” Crowley suggested, tipping a few cans of ravioli into Aziraphale’s arms. The angel gave them a suspicious look. He didnt trust food that came wrapped in metal, and he honestly cant understand a single word on the back of the package.  
  
“What’s a microwave?” He asked, trailing after Crowley as the demon pushes more things into Aziraphale’s basket with even seemingly less care.

“It’s this human tool,” Crowley tried explaining, his hand gestures doing little more than adding to the angel's confusion. “Like a stove in a box.”  
  
“An oven?” Aziraphale had an oven in his store, of course, and a stovetop. It’s all very modern, as far as Aziraphale is concerned. Crowley said it looked like heaven on Earth. Aziraphale was rather sure the demon didn’t mean this as a compliment. “Why not just call it an oven, then?”  
  
“A smaller box,” Crowley held his hands apart, about the length of a nice tall box of books. “A small, white box that heats up food.”  
  
“Well I don’t have one,” Aziraphale pointed out. He held up a few of the can goods Crowley had knocked into the small cart. “How do you expect to cook these?”  
  
“Fine then, put them back.” Crowley didn’t put them back himself. He did throw a bag of garlic into the basket, though.  
  
“You haven’t done this shopping thing before, have you?” Aziraphale asked, kindly of course but perhaps with a trace of smugness. He began actually sorting through the potpourii of groceries, setting some back and allowing (far less) to stay.

It didn’t matter where he put an item, as the shelves seemed to be able to sort themselves out. 

"What of course not? Why bother? There was a pause, and it was not, Aziraphale felt,  good, calming pause. Finally Crowley asked,  “Have you?”  
  
“No,” Aziraphale answered which... Well he's certainly shopped just not like this and Crowley had sounded so unsure. He worried over this for a while before adding, “But I don’t think we’re going about it the right way.”

Then, suddenly, Crowley is grabbing his shoulder, turning him around on the spot. Aziraphale froze ready for a demon or Gabriel or heaven forbid they send Micheal.

Instead, what he actually sees is what appears to be a nice young couple, kissing over a cart filled with bread and greens, rather oblivious to the attention. They were much more interested in each other then any food or persons hanging about.

"Well Angel," And then Crowley is too close again, the kind where Aziraphale can feel his breath against his ear and dear l- h- dear me was that his tongue? “Should we be doing it that way?”  
  
The part of Aziraphale that hadn’t been turned entirely human knew there was nothing wrong with the scene. Only a bit of natural behavior. The rest of him promptly blushed. “I don’t think they’re doing it right, either.”  
  
Crowley took off his sunglasses and pushed his hand through his hair which seemed rather pointless when it only fixed itself but perhaps he liked that.

He looked disappointed.

“There’s this great restaurant down the street,” he said. “Come on Angel.”

He was missing something. There was this sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach and he didn't like it or know quite what it meant. But oh he wish Croqley wouldnt look so defeated. Surely they could figure this out, two immortal beings and all.

"Do.." Aziraphale glanced around unsure still what he was looking for. "Do you think you’ll be safe?”

Crowley shook his head and growled. “I’ll be safe. All the demons have gone home. No point sticking around your place any more. It’s not like you were every going to do something about it.”

Aziraphale blinked. Then again. His hands fluttered and his mouth made a few shapes but no sounds.

By the time he gets his voice back he's still standing there, half empty back in hand, watching Crowley March out the street. And all he can think to say is, "But.... But I went shopping with you."


End file.
